


At A Crossroad In Life

by ThatOddNerd



Category: Doctor Who, Torchwood
Genre: Angst, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-10
Updated: 2014-11-10
Packaged: 2018-02-24 19:10:48
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,521
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2592998
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThatOddNerd/pseuds/ThatOddNerd
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jack and Twelve run into each other on a small outlying planet, and have a heart-to-heart in a bar.</p>
            </blockquote>





	At A Crossroad In Life

* * *

 

They're sitting in a corner booth at some bar located on an outer planet just outside Raxacoricofallapatorius, and neither of them had said a word for a solid fifteen minutes. Not because Jack was still getting over the shock of the Doctor's newest regeneration, he was used to it by now (" I met your fourth regeneration back in the early 60's you know." He tells the Doctor as they enter the bar. "Oh really? How'd that go?" "We were being chased by Daleks and after all was said and done you asked me what I thought of the scarf. You had obviously just regenerated, and weren't sure about the outfit." "What did you say?" "I told you I thought it was the greatest thing ever." "I always did love the scarf." "So did I."), nor was it because the Doctor was feeling tempted to tell Jack he does die eventually, and he was with him when he does, (He'd been more and more honest about the secrets he'd been adamant on keeping from his friends.) but rather, they just couldn't think of what to say to each other. Jack is tired and wary of the universe, and so is the Doctor, and the air of the situation was that there really wasn't much to say anymore. What more could be said? 

After half an hour of silence came about, the Doctor made an attempt at chatting. 

"Why did you leave Earth?" he asks, feeling it to be a fair enough question. Jack had been so sure about staying the last time he saw him. 

"Why did you? You said you hadn't been in a long time." That was fair. 

"Lately it's felt like I've been hurting more than helping." The Doctor admitted. "I've either pushed everyone away, or they have died, or..."

"They're stuck in another universe?" Jack offered. The Doctor nodded. 

"What about yourself?" the Doctor asked.

"Pretty much the same reasons." Jack admitted, downing the rest of the alcohol in the tumblr in front of him and picking up the menu pad to order another. 

"What happened to your team?" 

"All except one of them are dead." Jack's tone took on a serious, tired, sad feel, and the Doctor couldn't help but shift a bit uncomfortably in his seat. 

"Which one..."

"Gwen. And now she, her husband, and her daughter are in hiding. Everything went to shit." 

"What happened to..."

"It's a long story." He replied, watching the liquid fill the glass once more. "Owen got shot, came back to life, then died a second time at a nuclear plant. Toshiko was shot. Ianto..." The Doctor was well familiar with the feeling that was had when someone you loved very dearly is lost to you forever. The love of your life (Or in their cases, many lives.), your soulmate, it was rough. 

"You don't have to talk about it if you don't..."

"You know about the 456 incident." Statement, not a question. 

"Yes." 

"That's what happened to him." His voice hardened and he sucked in a breath. "He died in my arms. Told me he loved me, and then he died." Jack laughed a laugh with no mirth in it, and downed the drink again/ "He said he was sure in a thousand years I'd forget all about him. I told him I wouldn't."

"How long has it been for you?" Such was the life of Time Travellers. You never knew how old they really were.

" Two thousand years. Jesus Christ, it's been two thousand years."  Jack sighed and stared at the ice pieces left over in his glass. "Do you ever wonder why the universe chose us to be such miserable bastards?" 

"Because we faced the universe head on and said 'Come on, do your worst. Come and get me.' " The Doctor replied without missing a beat. Jack looked up from his glass to him, raising an eyebrow inquisitively. "I've had plenty of time." he reminded him. 

"I guess we have, haven't we." 

"Of course, you never asked for your situation." The Doctor reminded him. "You didn't ask to be brought back forever." Not entirely forever, but now isn't the time for that. 

"You didn't ask for your regenerations." Jack vollied. The Doctor smiled and Jack smiled back. 

"Touche." 

"We live. We love. We die. We start all over again." 

"How poetic." The Doctor commented, rolling his eyes. Jack laughed.

"You're still cheeky in your old age."

"So are you." 

"I missed you Doctor." 

"I missed you too Jack." Jack raised both eyebrows this time. "Impossibility or not, I still missed you."

"Your tenth regeneration was a bit unnerved by me." 

"Oh Jack, you've unnerved many of my regenerations, but for good reasons." Jack laughed again, and the Doctor smiled. 

"So, got any news about your life, besides the fact that you've gone grey, which you wear well might I add."

"Why thank you. Well, I saw the Master again." 

"Oh really?" 

"Yes, and they were a woman. Called herself Missy. For Mistress." 

"And she is...?"

"Gone. Disintegrated."

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be. It's fine. I'd already sort of accepted it before I met Missy."

"Must be lonely though."

" I could say the same about you." Jack nodded.

"We make a hell of a pair don't we?" Jack commented.

"We sure do." The Doctor played with the napkin on the table next to his drink (It was like beer, but knocked you on your ass harder than vodka, as Jack liked to put it.), and pondered where to go next.

"I regret letting Ianto join my team." Jack said out of the blue. The Doctor looked at him, puzzled. "I've lost...so many people. I've even lost my grandson, and my daughter won't speak to me because of it. I've lost my brother, my parents. Everyone I have ever cared about. Some of it, I had no control over, but sometimes I feel like if Ianto hadn't joined my team, if we had never been together, if he had just...stayed with his sister, not gone off with me because he was just that kind of person, he would have lived and died of old age, instead of being 28 and dying of an alien poison and not with his family. It was too much. Losing Suzie, Tosh, and Owen hurt. Losing Ianto  was like the gun being fired, and...losing my grandson was the bullet entering my body. I couldn't stay there, it was too much. Earth holds so many memories for me and it feels like it held more bad than good."

"I had a family, back on Gallifrey. A wife, children, grandchildren. A life. But I was always so restless, and then the War happened and... I lost them. Family has always been my weakness in all forms. I lost mine and kept losing them. Whether they were in the form of my companions or the people I married afterwards, I keep losing my family. I keep wrecking others as well. There was this one family my last regeneration was acquainted with, the Pond-Williams family. Amy, Rory, and their daughter Melody.... River. Her alias was River Song." 

"I've heard of her." Jack said, suddenly remembering something. "I think I met her once at a party. We got along great."

"I'm not surprised, you two are a lot alike." The Doctor couldn't help the smile that came to him. "They went with me, or rather, Amy and Rory went with me. We had adventures, we fought, cried, loved, and I ruined their lives. Amy and Rory were taken by Weeping Angels, and River died to save me and all these other people on this one planet. Amy and Rory were robbed of the opportunity of raising their daughter because of an organization that wanted her to be trained to kill me."

"Rose..." 

"Rose and her mother nearly died countless times and it's my fault they ended up in an alternate universe." 

"But they're happy now, aren't they?" 

"Yes, but at what cost?" Jack stayed silent. "I destroy lives Jack." 

"But you have also saved billions of others." 

"That doesn't make up for all the ones I've ruined. I hurt the people I care about." 

"We all do." Jack felt his heart breaking, and how could it not? "It makes us...real." 

"I suppose." 

"What about Mickey Smith? I kind of lost touch with him after..." 

"Married Martha Jones." 

"Really? Didn't see that one coming." 

"Neither did Mickey." The two men laughed and decided it was time to leave. They got up, left some money, and walked out of the bar. Before they split for their respective modes of transport, they said their goodbyes. 

"So, tell me Doctor, will you see me again?" 

"Yes." 

"How many times?" 

"Oh several, several times." The Doctor replied, smiling. 

"Lucky you." The Doctor rolled his eyes and Jack laughed. " Call me, alright? If you need me." 

"I will."

"You don't have to do this alone." 

"Yes I do Jack." Jack said nothing for a few seconds, then nodded. 

"Good bye Doctor." 

"Good bye Jack." 

And they went their separate ways. 

 

The End.

 


End file.
